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Merry Christmas and a big thank you to all who have done something "nice" for someone in need this holiday season.

Maybe you "adopted" a child from the Salvation Army Angel Tree, or collected food for Second Harvest, or bought toys for Toys for Tots or the Last Minute Toy Store, or donated to your church or supported a homeless program or other hardworking charity.

Or maybe you paid it forward at Wal-Mart or Starbucks or the McDonald's drive-through.

I particularly want to thank those of you who stepped up to help some of our needy neighbors and organizations we identified in our Ms. Cheap/Avenue Bank "What would you do if someone gave you $500?" contest.

Some of you offered gift cards, some offered services such as hair styling and car repairs, and some offered in-kind donations, such as yarn, warm clothes, teddy bears, a collection of makeup and pet supplies.

Some nice person offered to donate dining room chairs to Dismas House (a local halfway house), and a woman is buying a new dishwasher for the Dismas kitchen.

A 6-year-old girl wanted to donate a Barbie house and kitchen set to another little girl who might enjoy them, and someone anonymously dropped off a bag full of new teddy bears for a lady who had requested them to hand out to children at area hospital emergency rooms on Christmas Eve.

Most of this outpouring of goodness did not come from big, fancy foundations or corporations, but rather from local people such as Cindy Steyer, a Smyrna hairstylist who read our story and called to see if she could provide some clothes and tennis shoes for a kindergarten boy, whose grandmother is struggling to raise him.

"I feel so blessed. I like to help people," said Steyer, who also offered to help Michael Gifford, a hardworking La Vergne warehouse worker who had begged for some help to provide a decent Christmas for his wife and teen-age daughters.

Gifford's request read: "I work two jobs and a lot of overtime and am still in the hole. I work work work with nothing to show for it. I want nothing, just for my family to have a Christmas. Please Help!"

Steyer first offered to provide some free hair services for Gifford's wife and 13- and 14-year-old daughters, and then she told

Gifford that her salon would also "gather up some stuff" for his family before Christmas Eve.

Help for Gifford's family also came from Hilda Williams who told me that her mind (and heart) kept going back to Gifford — so she sent him a Wal-Mart gift card.

"I got a call out of the blue from this nice lady," said Gifford, who plans to use the card to buy clothes for his daughters. "It took a lot of stress off my chest."

"These are heartbreaking stories," said Williams, who also sent a gift card to a struggling grandmother who is raising an autistic grandson.

"I know $100 will not do all that they need, but maybe it will bring some joy in knowing that others feel their pain and want to help," Williams told me.

Janet Wells of South Nashville, an avid yard sale and estate sale shopper, offered to change her shopping focus, and she will now be looking for pet supplies for a woman who had asked for money to help financially strapped pet owners, as well as shopping for pots and pans for immigrant families that are being served through Nations Ministry.

"Yard sales are a dream, and I can find all kinds of things people need," Wells said.

Patti Czarnik offered car repairs at her family's J&E Automotive business to help two of the people who wrote the contest, and also said she'd like to help local Girl Scout Adeline Crawford, who requested the contest money to pay for blankets, medicine and food for some abused horses that are being cared for at Safe Harbor Equine Livestock Sanctuary.

And another good soul filled several bags with children's coats and warm clothing to give out at Charlotte Park Elementary School, where so many of the children do not own a coat.

And state worker Martha Morrow of Inglewood hit the jackpot with her request for yarn to make scarves and caps for the homeless and for cancer patients. Morrow, a cancer survivor, will be receiving yarn donations from several sources, including Deb Stillwell of Knit and Crochet Tennessee, and Annette Miller, who had been wanting to find a good place to donate a hamper of yarn that had belonged to her mother who died earlier this year.

It "made" my Christmas to see so many generous people respond so freely to help perfect strangers, and I know that their selfless efforts have "made" Christmas brighter for at least a few of our neighbors in need.

Special thanks to Avenue Bank for providing a $500 prize and two $250 prizes in the "Ms. Cheap/Avenue Bank What would you do if someone gave you $500 contest?" Landon and Isabella Fortesque received $500 to give to the Domestic Violence Program in Murfreesboro. Dismas House residents received $250 to provide an appreciation dinner for the volunteers who serve them. And $250 went to Nations Ministry to help immigrants with training and job placement and other services.

Can you help, too?

Patti Czarnik is one of those people who loves to help others and doesn't give up easily. When she heard about Sherri Ellison's desperate plea for car repair help so that she could get herself to work and her autistic grandson to school, Patti offered for her family's auto repair business, J&E Automotive, to try and fix the car.

Ellison, who is a child care worker at St. Mary's Villa Child Development Center, had written in the contest that she has been without her car since October, when it "started pulling and jerking" and then died. She said if she won any money, "it would go towards some means of transportation. I am a woman of faith," she wrote, noting that she is raising a 15-year-old grandson with autism.

Czarnik promptly sent a tow truck out to Ellison's home and hauled the car into her Charlotte Pike garage for a diagnosis, which sadly turned up a serious transmission issue — a repair job that would ordinarily cost around $4,300.

Undaunted, Czarnik told me, "I don't give up easily" and agreed to provide the labor for the job free, donate some money herself and ask (aka "plead") with the transmission supplier, Jasper Engines and Transmissions, to discount the transmission for Ellison's 2002 Isuzu.

Jasper happily agreed to discount the transmission, and now the gap is just about $1,500 to complete the job and provide Ellison a workable car by New Year's.

Czarnik has helped, Jasper has helped, and you can help, too. Just call Mallory Smith at Avenue Bank at 615-963-2303 to make a donation to the "transmission replacement" fund for Sherri.

I will report back after New Year's on how this played out for Ellison and her car.